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Does anyone else save for skids college or am I just weird?

just.his.wife's picture

I was over the moon yesterday, my DD dropping her POS boyfriend put me on a natural high that I figured nothing could bring me down from. Then I got home. Skid1 (aka sdnow19) was in tears. She and DH are talking back and forth outside on the porch and she retired to her room still in tears, DH heads to our room obviously not to emotionally happy either.

Shit. There goes my good mood.

So I go talk to DH figuring they had a moment where he had to be a father and be harsh. Skid1 is due to start the local community college within weeks. What I got out of DH was that he was a total failure as a parent and blah blah blah blah.

DH and SD were stressing over her college costs. Apparently while going through doing her FAFSA they determined he could not afford for her to go to college. That one caused me to pause, blink and scratch my head as I KNOW her 529 has about 20k in it that I alone have put in there. He had forgotten about the 529.

He also forgot that we file taxes separately, so no, my income does NOT count on her FAFSA. This was the #2 reason why we file separately! It’s not my responsibility to pay for his kids college so therefore my income should not be factored into their FAFSA. (#1 reason was that BM does not need to know my fianances) I sat down and redid her FAFSA the correct way and low and behold the score is a big fat 0. Aka she is eligible for Pell grants etc. Skid1 went from tears of disappointment to very happy jumping up and down that she could get financial aid and go to college.

Then she found out about the 529 account, and burst back into tears that she could not believe I saved for college for her all these years when she was such a rotten little asshole to me. (Her words not mine.) Let’s face it even in a community college 20k is not going to go far it’s not like I handed her a free ride. I contribute to 6 different 529 accounts, my kids and his kids. My kids are almost done. I will admit that I contribute MORE to my kids than his. When my kids are done with school the $ I contributed to their accounts will be quartered and placed in the skids accounts until they are done with school.

To me it’s a peace of mind investment. If I invest in their education, they should get a degree or training in a field that will allow them to support themselves… which greatly reduces the chance of any of them trying to move back in!

Comments

arjuna79's picture

jhw, that is just awesome. and the best part is that sdnow19 gets it. I was a single mom and hustled what I could to get my daughter going in community college. But what I DID manage to do was hire her as my office assistant and started her RothIRA. So now at 25 she's got a nice chunk of her future growing.
what an amazing process you have perservered through with these kids.

just.his.wife's picture

No, lol, trust me I am NOT.

I just want all six of the damn kids OUT of my house and NOT moving back in!!! I want to know what it is like to live - alone with just my husband and NOT hear 'mom/dad' every 5 minutes!

It is self preservation!!

just.his.wife's picture

SD last year was 50/50 with both parents until BM got arrested, she then lived with dad for a few months... then became a ward of the state for the remainder of her minority living at brother in laws house. She then spent almost five months with BM living at BM's parents house, with BM having little to no income.

Her FAFSA was filled out correctly, with information from BMs taxes as BM was the one that claimed her for fiscal year 2012 and skid1 spent the majority of the year WITH BM. She did not move in with us until 2013 and that was AFTER we had a court order lifted which prohibited her from spending more than 2 hours consecutively in our house around her siblings.

There was NOTHING fraudulent about her FAFSA filing. There will be nothing fraudulent about future filings as her father and I have a written RENTAL agreement, there are NO co-mingled finances, and he declares head of household (due to having dependants he has the greater tax break from it).

Getting called on the carpet by the IRS is not on my bucket list.

Here is an idea: stop presuming that others lie on official forms.